South Canterbury Times. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1881.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2677, 18 October 1881, Page 2

South Canterbury Times. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1881.

Learning by experience is slow and weary work, and oftentimes expensive. The colony has studied, to some purpose under the most relentless of teachers during the past ten years, but whether, as Mr Weller, senior, remarked respecting his experience of married life, it was worth while going through so much to learn so little, is altogether a matter of opinion. Ignorance is sometimes a state of bliss, and a country without a history is said to have much to congratulate itself upon. ■ Unfortunately this colony has been very busy in manufacturing material for the future historian in a small kind of a way, and the verdict of posterity will very likely be that it might have been better employed. The present generation have done much towards opening up the resources of the country, but they have at the same time in a great measure squandered the public estate which it was sought to develope. The rough edge has been taken off the work of colonisation, and all the best agricultural areas of the country have been brought within easy reach of the coast by means of railway communication, and yet the progress made by the colony is not at all proportionate to the immense expenditure of public money. It may be well to cast bread upon the waters in the hope of finding it again in the future, but money sown broadcast without any definite object in view generally disappears altogether, and does not come back to the hand of the sower. It inflates business, and is productive of untold evils. The colony has nothing tangible to show for a large amount of the numerous loans, but jf we only take into account that portion which has been spent in facilitating the carriage of produce, and indirectly aiding colonisation in other ways, the result cannot be regarded with much complacency. Kecently published statistics show that the value of our exports and imports in proportion to the population, and as compared with other colonies, is nothing to be very proud about. Our population it is true has increased faster than that of any other colony of the Australasian group, but after all it is a mere handful, and only represents one year’s immigration into the United States. We possess every attraction in the way of climate and soil, ami the chief natural drawback is the distance from the overcrowded countries of Europe. It is no great achievement to have increased our population by something like a quarter of a million in the coarse

of ten years, to have diverted as it were a small trickle of emigration in the direction of the colony, when there is a mighty stream flowing continually into the new territories of the American continent. The majority of that vast number of people who annually leave the places of their birth in Europe, go in quest of a place where they can make new homes, and where they can ’settle down and rear families, and fulfil the primal law of multiplying and replenishing the earth, and subduing it. The ownership of land is one of the strongest instincts of mankind. There are few men, Saxon or Celt, who do not covet the possession of a spot on the face of the country which they can call their own, even though it be only a quarteracre building section. It is, perhaps, only a sentiment, but it will in all probability prove too strong to admit of the theory of State ownership being carried into practice. “ Unearned increment ” is of course an attraction, but the desire of land ownership lies even deeper than the desire of gain, and the country that is in a position to gratify this feeling cheaply and readily naturally attracts population. By defective land laws we have raised up an artificial barrier against the tide of immigration, and have in a great measure rendered our Public Works system abortive. We built railways, but took no steps to settle people on the land until the cream of it had been secured by large investors. The fact of so much of the best of the land having been bought by speculators does not affect its natural fertility, but it makes all the difference in developing the resources of the country. Men of the finest stamp, who, under a wise administration of the public estates, would be cultivating their own freeholds and making homes for themselves, are now compelled to take land for cropping, on the very great chances of there being a margin of profit to recompense them for the year’s slavery after rent and expenses are paid. It is no wonder that the farming population of Canterbury is being attracted to Southland by the deferred payment system of the large companies in that district. We are no advocates for putting men on the land without the requisite knowledge or capital to work it, but the land of Canterbury at the present time is locked up to small capitalists. Speculators hold out for such large prices that there is no opening for men with a few hundred pounds. Either the demands of the speculators must become more reasonable or there will be a steady outflow of the very best of our working agricultural population towards the South. Experience has shown that the value placed upon land in Canterbury is, to a great extent, fictitious. Much of the land is of the very best quality for agricultural purposes, but in face of the increasing competition all over the world, low average prices for produce must be looked for. The price of land is in the long run ruled by the value of what it will produce. Except in times of speculative excitement men will not buy land on terms which will make the rest of their lives a long climb up hill. It will be remembered that the Lincolnshire delegates were greatly impressed with the agricultural advantages of Canterbury, but the prices asked for the land deterred them and their friends at Home from investing here. The country is capable of carrying a population which could afford to laugh at the public debt and the burden of interest which it entails, but neither by legislation or any other means can the effects of a long course of mismanagement be effaced till many years have elapsed.